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Germantown hunter hits his mark Joe Foppe took down a wild boar with a long bow

Belleville News-Democrat
BY BRIAN BRUEGGEMANN

June 08, 2006 To see that thing running with an arrow sticking out of it, I just couldn't believe it After a deer hunt one morning, while eating breakfast with some hunting buddies, Joe Foppe of Germantown brought up the crazy idea.

He wanted to go hunting with a longbow.

One of his friends finished a bite, then held up an eating utensil.

'Joe,' the friend said, 'you might as well go hunting with this spoon!'

That did it. The challenge was on.

By late last year, Foppe owned a longbow made by friend, taxidermist and bowyer Paul Jarvis of the Troy area. This is no ordinary bow. Modern compound bows are engineering marvels, with their webs of strings and cams and dampers. But Foppe's bow, it's a work of art.

It's carved from a stave of Osage orange wood, then covered on one side with deer sinew, or tendons, for added strength. The grip is made from brain-tanned buckskin. The bow is covered with a lacquer that gives it the artistic look.

Could such a beautiful but primitive weapon take down a big-game animal?

Foppe was about to find out.

Last weekend, Foppe and some friends headed to Monterey, Tenn., for a wild boar hunt. He went into the hunt with no preconceived notions.

'If I shot a hog, I shot a hog,' Foppe said. 'I had no idea what to expect. I'd never been on a guided hunt.'

On the first day, his group headed up the mountain without a guide, but with the help of Moses, a mixed-breed hound that looked a mess. He had scars on his body, some still-bloody wounds, chunks bitten out of his ears and an eye socket that had tissue protruding from behind the eye.

Moses is aptly named. He can part the timber and find hogs. If he's barking, you know he's pestering a boar. The Wilderness Hunting Lodge and guide Todd Devine have other hunting dogs, including Chigger, which also is aptly named. Chigger, a pit bull-mix that Devine describes as 'just a bad little dog,' bites into a hog and doesn't let go.

But Foppe opted for Moses, and soon learned that the poor old hound can't keep a boar bayed for long. Foppe's trip was filled with sprints up and down the mountain, chasing Moses, only to arrive too late to get a shot.

'The first time up the mountain, we had three hogs running past us real fast,' Foppe said. 'I couldn't get a good shot, so I didn't shoot.'

But Foppe and his crew kept chasing Moses, and eventually another boar.

'The dog started barking at the top of the mountain. We were near the bottom of the mountain,' Foppe recalled.

When the hunters arrived at the top of the mountain, Moses was on a boar. One of Joe's hunting buddies -- the one who made the comment about hunting with a spoon -- approached from the left and was first to get into shooting range. He fired an arrow from his compound bow, but it hit nothing. Airball.

The angry hog sprinted to the right -- headed straight toward Foppe. Foppe took a couple of steps back, and the boar veered away from him. Foppe drew his bow and fired an arrow at the running hog, about 15 feet away.

Modern compound bows are deadly accurate. But a hunter has to take several steps before firing a compound bow: Make sure the string is against the nose, make sure the peep sight is aligned with the sight pins, estimate the distance of the target, select the proper sight pin, then squeeze the trigger.

But with a longbow, it's all instinct. It's a reflex, it's something automatic. With enough practice, it gets to be like a pitcher who can place a baseball with precision -- the ball and the arrow become natural extensions of the body. Foppe practices shooting his longbow five or six nights a week, typically flinging about 60 arrows.

The arrow Foppe shot at the hog hit paydirt.

'I had a direct hit, right into the side,' Foppe said.

But the hog kept running with the arrow lodged in it, and with Moses in pursuit.

'To see that thing running with an arrow sticking out of it, I just couldn't believe it,' Foppe said. 'All the practice paid off, I guess.'

Or maybe not.

The hog kept running. It appeared to be bloody, but did the arrow penetrate the thick, armor plate that surrounds a wild boar's vital organs?

'I thought he might run another 20 yards and die, but the wild boar are so tough,' Foppe said.

He went running after the hog, and then could hear that Moses had it bayed again.

'I tried to slip in for another shot, but I spooked it another 50 yards down,' Foppe said.

Moses chased down the boar again. Foppe caught up and shot another arrow from about 15 yards. It was another direct hit. But still, the hog kept running, with Moses on its tail. Moses chased the hog down another ridge, out of sight.

Soon the dog was barking, but then the barking stopped. The silence meant Moses' work was done. The hog was dead.

Devine, the hunting guide, said hunters at Wilderness Hunting Lodge frequently use compound bows, but longbows aren't very common there.

'You don't see too many longbows,' Devine said.

Foppe used to question his hunting ability with the longbow.

'I was always skeptical of even releasing an arrow,' he said.

Not anymore. And when the Illinois archery deer season opens in just a few months, you can bet that Foppe will be in the timber with his longbow.

.....nu OGSÅ ejer af en 243win :-)

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